Regarding why analytical USUALLY is anti-musical, the thinking is a lot like when people caution against gear obsession and lose sight of music and audio. If you're picking apart all the technical details and separating all the instruments, then most would lose sight of the effect of the whole ensemble, how they compliment eachother; and frankly sometimes when it's too tight and controlled, then it feels like something is being held back from ROCKING OUT!, and it's just not as exciting.

Then I've never listened to a song, and frankly, I wouldn't want to. When I listen to music, I hear every note as I would see it on sheet music, I hear all the EQs the producer used, I hear the entire process, all of the sweat and blood that went into the song. Its so exciting to me. I'm getting some more "musical" headphones soon, so I'll see if I wasted my money there.

When songs are played in the background of things, I get really distracted because I can't stop focusing on it. I can't just listen to music and sit still.

Edit: I just realized the reason I boost my treble by 6 db is not because I like treble, but because it gives off a false sense of detail. My 280s aren't detailed enough for me.

Has anyone here tried the SoundMAGIC HP100 for gaming? I ended up returning the 840 and getting these instead, and I must say... WOW! For a closed can it has a very good soundstage and is extremely fun.

or should i wait upon the AKG K612 or K712 Pro (do they have memory foam pads?)

any suggestions? - is the positioning of the K601/612 worse than of the K7xx?

The anniversaries are not worth 2.5x the price of the regular x70x. If you can't get the anniversaries for ~$100 usd more than the Q701, just get the Q701 and then get the memory foam pads separate. The new K701s may also sound like the Q701s.

K712 should be the anniversary in a different color scheme. The K612 (K601) doesn't have memory foam and sounds different than the K70x. I'm not to familiar with how they sound though.

It can be had for $20 shipped, is about the size of the E10, and comes with 4 mini-to-mini interconnects. FYI there is nothing on the market like this for this price. That's why FiiO made it - they needed one for themselves but there's couldn't find any on the market so they just made their own.

This is something that a lot of Head-fiers could use, myself included (I just ordered one) so I thought I'd share it here.

It's $29, and is more versatile than the FiiO HS2. It has 6 IN/OUT ports (4x Dual RCAs, and 2x 3.5mm jacks), and all the of ports function as either an input or output depending on what is connected. They each have individual ON/OFF switches, so you can have any combination of the ports switched on. That means you can have any combination between 1 input to 5 outputs...and 5 inputs to 1 output simultaneously. You can also just use it as a simple switcher by just activating two ports at a time.

I own one of these as well.

I've got my DSS, Mixamp 5.8, ODAC, etc. all hooked up with the M-Stage hooked up as an output.

So I can easily switch the sources ON and OFF and mix in music from my PC/Sansa Clip+ while gaming.

what do you think of the K612 Pro - they are much cheaper than the others.

-are they any good for gaming compared to the 701?

First, welcome! Second, you're not going to get much feedback on that particular can for a while since they are just about to be released, but if we assume they are simply a K601 with a new name, then the answer will be that they aren't as good for competitive gaming as the K701 or any of its iterations (K702, Q701, K702 Annie). The good news is the Q701 continues to drop in price and is an absolute steal. You can't really go wrong with it for gaming. Obviously, refer to MLE's guide for more info.